2012-3-19 1
Chapter Ⅳ
The Literature of Realism
2012-3-19 2
A Review
of American Realistic Literature
2012-3-19 3
The Background
of American Realism
? The fifty years between the end of the
Civil War to the outbreak of the First
World War
? Changes in every aspect of American life
? Industrialization and the urbanization,
? ―The Gilded Age‖
? Tired of sentimental feelings of
Romanticism
? Interest in reality of life
2012-3-19 4
William Dean Howells,
― I confess I do not care to judge any
work of the imagination without first
applying this test to it,We must ask
ourselves before anything else,Is it true?
–true to the motives,the impulses,the
principles that shape the life of actual
men and women?‖
2012-3-19 5
The Characteristic
of American Realism
? Interpretation of the actualities of any
aspect of life,free from subjective
prejudice,idealism,or romantic color,
2012-3-19 6
1,Historical Background,
? ―The Gilded Age‖,
? In the period between the end of the Civil War and the
beginning of World War I,the country developed
rapidly in various fields,
? By the 1870s the New England Renaissance had
waned,A host of new writers appeared,
? They sought to portray American life as it really was,
? Local color fiction reached its peak of popularity in the
1880s,
? Naturalism dominated American literature of the first
decade of 20th century,
2012-3-19 7
2,Walt Whitman (1819-1892),
? the poet of American democracy
? Major Works,The Free Man (1848-1849); Leaves
of Grass (1865)
? General themes,
? Sidney Lanier,―As nearly as I can make it out,
Whitman’s argument seems to be that…because the
Mississippi is long,therefore every American is God.‖
? Whitman identified himself with the common man,
? ―I celebrate myself and sing myself‖—but ―I ―here is
everyone,
2012-3-19 8
Whitman’s subjects,
? The range of Whitman’s subjects is
remarkable and intentional,for he set out
to include and celebrate everything,
? Against the Victorian reticence
concerning physical relations,he urged
honest recognition of sensuality without
shame,all in the name of the glory of the
individual and the senses,
2012-3-19 9
Whitman’s Poetic Style,
? Original,revolutionary,indisputably
American; Fee-verse; Whitman created
nicknames for mean of different states,
? His habit of using vignettes—snapshots
as some critics have called them—brief
pictures,often complete in a single line,
2012-3-19 10
3,Emily Dickinson (1830— 1886),
? ―The recluse of Amherst” ;
? She was born in Amherst,
Massachusetts,She never married and
seldom left her hometown,
? She wrote over 1000 lyrics in her life,
which were published posthumously,
? Dickinson writes about love,mortality
and immortality…She is a writer of great
power and beauty,
2012-3-19 11
Dickinson,
―Because I could not stop for Death‖
Question,
What is the symbolism of the school,the
fields,the setting sun,the house ―that
seemed / a Swelling in the Ground‖?
2012-3-19 12
4,Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896)
? Family Background,
raised in a strongly religious atmosphere
Her father Lyman Beecher,was a
distinguished clergyman;
Two brothers (Henry Ward and Edward),
celebrated preachers;
Older sister (Catherine),an educator
2012-3-19 13
Harriet Beecher Stowe
(1811-1896)
2012-3-19 14
Stowe’s House in Cincinnati
2012-3-19 15
Cincinnati Suspension Bridge over Ohio River
2012-3-19 16
,The Mother’s Struggle”,
A Scene from Uncle Tom’s Cabin
2012-3-19 17
Mrs,Stowe’s Life,
Born,June 14,1811 - Litchfield,Connecticut
In 1832,Moved to Cincinnati,Father,president
of Lane Theological Seminary
In 1836,married Calvin Ellis Stowe,a seminary
professor at Lane;
In 1830s,and 1840s,wrote stories for
magazines;
By 1850,she was the mother of seven children;
In 1850,moved to Brunswick,Maine
Died,July 1,1896 - Hartford,Connecticut
2012-3-19 18
Comments on Stowe’s Life
? A sharply alternating mixture of success and
notoriety and personal tragedy and pain,
? Traveled widely,met heads of state such as
Abraham Lincoln and Queen Victoria,
? Her seventieth birthday was something of a
national event,
? Two sons died very young,another was an
alcoholic,the scandal of her brother…
2012-3-19 19
Facts about Uncle Tom’s Cabin
? Based on several slave narratives,such as those of
Frederick Douglass and Josiah Henson,
? 18 years living across the Ohio River from
slaveholding communities;
? from fugitive slaves and visits to the South,she got a
personal knowledge of the institution of slavery,
? The author’s sense of her own suffering and
oppression in the characters of Tom and his fellow
slave Eliza,the protagonists of the book’s two main
plots,
2012-3-19 20
Popularity of Uncle Tom’s Cabin
? Written in spare moments after doing housework,
Serially published in the National Era (from June
5,1851 to April 1,1852)
? An overnight success---- sold 3000 copies the
first day; Sold 350,000 copies in the first year;
? an international bestseller; translated into about
40 languages
? The nonfiction,A Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin
(1853)
2012-3-19 21
5,O,Henry (1862— 1910)
? Real name,William Sidney Porter
? A prolific writer,
? He wrote most often of New York city,where he spent
his later years,His name for the city was ―Baghdad on
the Subway.‖
? Born in North Carolina,without much schooling and
virtually orphaned,
? He followed several occupations,a bookkeeper,a
drugstore clerk and a Texas Ranger,
? A central figure in the peak period of the American
magazine short story,
? Died in drunkenness,
2012-3-19 22
Characteristics of O,Henry’s Works,
? His work is full of humor; his stories are amusing;
Drawing directly from his experience with many odd
jobs,he combined realism with a world of his own,
reflecting a fatalistic view of life; T
? His work is typically American,and he gives us a
good idea of various types of people in the United
States;
? The theme of his stories is often based on some self-
sacrificing member of a family who is undergoing
hardship to help a close relative,He also addresses
questions of loneliness,of desolate people,of
grotesque underlings.‖
2012-3-19 23
O,Henry,Chief Works
? Cabbages and Kings (1904); The Four
Million (1906); The Trimmed Lamp
(1907); Heart of the West (1907); The
Voice of the City (1908); Roads of
Destiny (1909)
2012-3-19 24
6,Henry James (1843-1916)
? Life,born in New York; the son of the
theological writer Henry James,Sr,and the
brother of the pragmatist philosopher William
James,
? A realistic writer;
? The most expert stylist of his time;
? The first American to achieve a blend of
detailed observation and polished style;
? An admirer of European manners,
2012-3-19 25
Henry James,Chief Works
? The American (1877)
? ―Daisy Miller‖ (1878)
? Washington Square (1881)
? The Portrait of a Lady (1881)
? The Golden Bowl (1904)
2012-3-19 26
7,Mark Twain (1835-1910),
? Sam Clemens,A writer of humorous Western
tales and sketches,
? Life,
Sam worked as a printer,wandering as far from
home as New York and Philadelphia; A pilot;
In 1885,his life took a sudden downward turn,
when he lost a large part of his fortune through
unwise investment,
A few years later,his daughter died,his wife
became an invalid,and died in 1904,
2012-3-19 27
The meaning of the name
Mark Twain,the second mark,or twelve
feet-deep,enough water to float any
steamboat,
2012-3-19 28
Mark Twain,major works
? Life on the Mississippi;
? Huckleberry Finn;
? Tom Sawyer
? Pudd’nhead Wilson;
2012-3-19 29
Mark Twain’s Style
? Precise,enviable,well-crafted
? A master of irony,
? Nuances of dialect and of the vernacular of
different classes and ethnic groups;
? Terse sarcasm;
? Use of local color and historical settings,
? From innocence to experience,
? Enamored of the American dream and
disillusioned by I,
2012-3-19 30
8,Jack London (1876-1916)
? A naturalist; Strong individualism;
? Life,an illegitimate child of an astrologer;
Jailed for vagrancy,Contac with the under-
privileged;
? Major Works
? The Call of the Wild (1903)
? The People of the Abyss (1903)
? The Sea Wolf (1904)
? Martin Eden (1909)
2012-3-19 31
Jack London,Style
? Forceful,and colorful;
? Subjectivity and enthusiasm
? His characterizations were often stiff and
his dialogue stereotyped,
2012-3-19 32
Theme of Jack London’s Works
? primitive violence,Anglo-Saxon
supremacy,biological evolution,class
warfare,and mechanistic determinism,
2012-3-19 33
9,Theodore Dreiser (1871— 1945)
? Dreiser sets forth his naturalistic concept
of American society,
? Dreiser has been acclaimed for this
sincere and profound consciousness of
the tragedy of life as he saw it in America,
despite the ugliness of his heavy style,
and his structural incompetence,chaotic
verbosity,and sometimes confused
character drawing,
Chapter Ⅳ
The Literature of Realism
2012-3-19 2
A Review
of American Realistic Literature
2012-3-19 3
The Background
of American Realism
? The fifty years between the end of the
Civil War to the outbreak of the First
World War
? Changes in every aspect of American life
? Industrialization and the urbanization,
? ―The Gilded Age‖
? Tired of sentimental feelings of
Romanticism
? Interest in reality of life
2012-3-19 4
William Dean Howells,
― I confess I do not care to judge any
work of the imagination without first
applying this test to it,We must ask
ourselves before anything else,Is it true?
–true to the motives,the impulses,the
principles that shape the life of actual
men and women?‖
2012-3-19 5
The Characteristic
of American Realism
? Interpretation of the actualities of any
aspect of life,free from subjective
prejudice,idealism,or romantic color,
2012-3-19 6
1,Historical Background,
? ―The Gilded Age‖,
? In the period between the end of the Civil War and the
beginning of World War I,the country developed
rapidly in various fields,
? By the 1870s the New England Renaissance had
waned,A host of new writers appeared,
? They sought to portray American life as it really was,
? Local color fiction reached its peak of popularity in the
1880s,
? Naturalism dominated American literature of the first
decade of 20th century,
2012-3-19 7
2,Walt Whitman (1819-1892),
? the poet of American democracy
? Major Works,The Free Man (1848-1849); Leaves
of Grass (1865)
? General themes,
? Sidney Lanier,―As nearly as I can make it out,
Whitman’s argument seems to be that…because the
Mississippi is long,therefore every American is God.‖
? Whitman identified himself with the common man,
? ―I celebrate myself and sing myself‖—but ―I ―here is
everyone,
2012-3-19 8
Whitman’s subjects,
? The range of Whitman’s subjects is
remarkable and intentional,for he set out
to include and celebrate everything,
? Against the Victorian reticence
concerning physical relations,he urged
honest recognition of sensuality without
shame,all in the name of the glory of the
individual and the senses,
2012-3-19 9
Whitman’s Poetic Style,
? Original,revolutionary,indisputably
American; Fee-verse; Whitman created
nicknames for mean of different states,
? His habit of using vignettes—snapshots
as some critics have called them—brief
pictures,often complete in a single line,
2012-3-19 10
3,Emily Dickinson (1830— 1886),
? ―The recluse of Amherst” ;
? She was born in Amherst,
Massachusetts,She never married and
seldom left her hometown,
? She wrote over 1000 lyrics in her life,
which were published posthumously,
? Dickinson writes about love,mortality
and immortality…She is a writer of great
power and beauty,
2012-3-19 11
Dickinson,
―Because I could not stop for Death‖
Question,
What is the symbolism of the school,the
fields,the setting sun,the house ―that
seemed / a Swelling in the Ground‖?
2012-3-19 12
4,Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896)
? Family Background,
raised in a strongly religious atmosphere
Her father Lyman Beecher,was a
distinguished clergyman;
Two brothers (Henry Ward and Edward),
celebrated preachers;
Older sister (Catherine),an educator
2012-3-19 13
Harriet Beecher Stowe
(1811-1896)
2012-3-19 14
Stowe’s House in Cincinnati
2012-3-19 15
Cincinnati Suspension Bridge over Ohio River
2012-3-19 16
,The Mother’s Struggle”,
A Scene from Uncle Tom’s Cabin
2012-3-19 17
Mrs,Stowe’s Life,
Born,June 14,1811 - Litchfield,Connecticut
In 1832,Moved to Cincinnati,Father,president
of Lane Theological Seminary
In 1836,married Calvin Ellis Stowe,a seminary
professor at Lane;
In 1830s,and 1840s,wrote stories for
magazines;
By 1850,she was the mother of seven children;
In 1850,moved to Brunswick,Maine
Died,July 1,1896 - Hartford,Connecticut
2012-3-19 18
Comments on Stowe’s Life
? A sharply alternating mixture of success and
notoriety and personal tragedy and pain,
? Traveled widely,met heads of state such as
Abraham Lincoln and Queen Victoria,
? Her seventieth birthday was something of a
national event,
? Two sons died very young,another was an
alcoholic,the scandal of her brother…
2012-3-19 19
Facts about Uncle Tom’s Cabin
? Based on several slave narratives,such as those of
Frederick Douglass and Josiah Henson,
? 18 years living across the Ohio River from
slaveholding communities;
? from fugitive slaves and visits to the South,she got a
personal knowledge of the institution of slavery,
? The author’s sense of her own suffering and
oppression in the characters of Tom and his fellow
slave Eliza,the protagonists of the book’s two main
plots,
2012-3-19 20
Popularity of Uncle Tom’s Cabin
? Written in spare moments after doing housework,
Serially published in the National Era (from June
5,1851 to April 1,1852)
? An overnight success---- sold 3000 copies the
first day; Sold 350,000 copies in the first year;
? an international bestseller; translated into about
40 languages
? The nonfiction,A Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin
(1853)
2012-3-19 21
5,O,Henry (1862— 1910)
? Real name,William Sidney Porter
? A prolific writer,
? He wrote most often of New York city,where he spent
his later years,His name for the city was ―Baghdad on
the Subway.‖
? Born in North Carolina,without much schooling and
virtually orphaned,
? He followed several occupations,a bookkeeper,a
drugstore clerk and a Texas Ranger,
? A central figure in the peak period of the American
magazine short story,
? Died in drunkenness,
2012-3-19 22
Characteristics of O,Henry’s Works,
? His work is full of humor; his stories are amusing;
Drawing directly from his experience with many odd
jobs,he combined realism with a world of his own,
reflecting a fatalistic view of life; T
? His work is typically American,and he gives us a
good idea of various types of people in the United
States;
? The theme of his stories is often based on some self-
sacrificing member of a family who is undergoing
hardship to help a close relative,He also addresses
questions of loneliness,of desolate people,of
grotesque underlings.‖
2012-3-19 23
O,Henry,Chief Works
? Cabbages and Kings (1904); The Four
Million (1906); The Trimmed Lamp
(1907); Heart of the West (1907); The
Voice of the City (1908); Roads of
Destiny (1909)
2012-3-19 24
6,Henry James (1843-1916)
? Life,born in New York; the son of the
theological writer Henry James,Sr,and the
brother of the pragmatist philosopher William
James,
? A realistic writer;
? The most expert stylist of his time;
? The first American to achieve a blend of
detailed observation and polished style;
? An admirer of European manners,
2012-3-19 25
Henry James,Chief Works
? The American (1877)
? ―Daisy Miller‖ (1878)
? Washington Square (1881)
? The Portrait of a Lady (1881)
? The Golden Bowl (1904)
2012-3-19 26
7,Mark Twain (1835-1910),
? Sam Clemens,A writer of humorous Western
tales and sketches,
? Life,
Sam worked as a printer,wandering as far from
home as New York and Philadelphia; A pilot;
In 1885,his life took a sudden downward turn,
when he lost a large part of his fortune through
unwise investment,
A few years later,his daughter died,his wife
became an invalid,and died in 1904,
2012-3-19 27
The meaning of the name
Mark Twain,the second mark,or twelve
feet-deep,enough water to float any
steamboat,
2012-3-19 28
Mark Twain,major works
? Life on the Mississippi;
? Huckleberry Finn;
? Tom Sawyer
? Pudd’nhead Wilson;
2012-3-19 29
Mark Twain’s Style
? Precise,enviable,well-crafted
? A master of irony,
? Nuances of dialect and of the vernacular of
different classes and ethnic groups;
? Terse sarcasm;
? Use of local color and historical settings,
? From innocence to experience,
? Enamored of the American dream and
disillusioned by I,
2012-3-19 30
8,Jack London (1876-1916)
? A naturalist; Strong individualism;
? Life,an illegitimate child of an astrologer;
Jailed for vagrancy,Contac with the under-
privileged;
? Major Works
? The Call of the Wild (1903)
? The People of the Abyss (1903)
? The Sea Wolf (1904)
? Martin Eden (1909)
2012-3-19 31
Jack London,Style
? Forceful,and colorful;
? Subjectivity and enthusiasm
? His characterizations were often stiff and
his dialogue stereotyped,
2012-3-19 32
Theme of Jack London’s Works
? primitive violence,Anglo-Saxon
supremacy,biological evolution,class
warfare,and mechanistic determinism,
2012-3-19 33
9,Theodore Dreiser (1871— 1945)
? Dreiser sets forth his naturalistic concept
of American society,
? Dreiser has been acclaimed for this
sincere and profound consciousness of
the tragedy of life as he saw it in America,
despite the ugliness of his heavy style,
and his structural incompetence,chaotic
verbosity,and sometimes confused
character drawing,
